Lisa Fluharty was called
for jury duty by the Fayette County Circuit Court in Lexington,
Kentucky in
April 2005. She was exclusively breastfeeding her 16-week-old daughter at
the time. She asked to be excused from jury service since her daughter
could not be bottle-fed. Lisa included information about her situation when
she sent her original jury summons form back to the court. She also wrote a
follow-up letter that included a note from her child's pediatrician stating
that if Lisa were separated from her child, her baby’s health would be
endangered and Lisa could develop significant medical complications from
being unable to adequately express her milk.

Lisa did not receive a
reply to her letter from the court, neither did she receive a phone call
after asking the court in her letter to call with their decision.

Finally, Lisa called the
court and was told that the entire panel of people called for that case had
been dismissed.

Lisa was never formally
excused by the Fayette County Circuit Court. If it were not for the case
being cancelled, Lisa would have had to serve, despite a doctor’s statement
that serving jury duty would have been detrimental to both Lisa’s and her
baby’s health.